


Meadow, Wheel, Pressure

by seapotato



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Angst Lite, Feelings, Getting Together, M/M, Post-Canon, Prompt writing, aesthetic, bc your relationship transcends time and space?????, good lighting, pushing the nature agenda, smoochy smooch, so soft, soft, soft smarties, still dumb though, the whole time????, when you've basically been together???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-04-05
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:47:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,278
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23502607
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seapotato/pseuds/seapotato
Summary: There is a meadow that Merlin had been to, once, on accident.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 15
Kudos: 117





	Meadow, Wheel, Pressure

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rinja](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinja/gifts).



> Ficlet written from the prompt "meadow, wheel, pressure" with Rinja. The goal was to write for 20 minutes, and it took me about an hour and a half #typical

There is a meadow that Merlin had been to, once, on accident. He had been walking idly through Camelot's forests on the pretense of foraging for Gaius, but really he just needed to be outside, around the thrum of lush, quiet magic that was, simply, the earth. He had slipped into the meadow without noticing: squeezing through a narrow gap between two boulders along the western edge of the forest, his eyes admired the foliated lichens in a hundred shades of green, blue, orange, yellow, his hands occupied by holding his satchel to his body so it didn't scrape against the rock. And then, on the other side, the meadow.

It was large, neatly rectangular with wildflowers and grasses that came nearly up to his waist. There was one path through, a slim trench that looked carved by wagon wheels. No hoof prints and no footprints. He walked the path from one side to the other, letting his hands hover and brush over the tips of the grasses, pausing to breath deeply the scent of sweetgrass and run his fingers along soft purple petals. The whole meadow was cast in a perfect golden light yet no sun was in the sky.

He let his magic seep out of his fingers and into the plants, let it slip down the riotous stalks and into the ground, twine with the deep roots. He questioned what it was, why it was here, but the only answer was an image of the meadow at dusk—the air and everything it touched a deep blue. He drifted in it for a moment feeling strangely content, full, complete.

The purpose was, perhaps, to just exist. Not for anyone or anything but itself.

He let some of the meadow in, just a little, just a wisp of sweetgrass and a little bit of the golden light, and let some of himself out, a memory of his mother and her face glowing warm in the firelight.

He left the meadow and didn't think about it until many, many years later he opened his eyes to find himself flat on his back, plants crushed under him, and Arthur kneeling over him looking worried, a hand under his neck. _Arthur_. How long had it been? A hundred years? A thousand? Longer?

“ _Arthur_ ,” he breathed. How he missed that name, sounding it out, the shape his mouth made around it.

Arthur helped him sit up, still frowning at him, still as beautiful as ever, as the day Merlin met him and the day he died and all the days in between. Missing him had become so much the fabric of Merlin's life, had become nearly every woven thread, that he had forgotten what it meant to truly _want_ in any real kind of way.

“Merlin,” Arthur said, his voice shaking, and then Arthur tipped forward and thunked his head against Merlin's shoulder, half across him, one arm snaking around Merlin's waist while the other stayed firm on the back of his neck. He was bracketed by Merlin's chest and folded up legs.

Merlin held his breath, taking him in, the solid warmth of Arthur's body, his heart beating too hard, and when Arthur started to say “I—” and cut himself off, Merlin wrapped his arms around him, curled his whole self around Arthur, and exhaled sharply into his hair.

“It's okay. It's alright. It's been a long time,” he said into Arthur's hair.

“I _died_ ,” Arthur said, bewildered and heartbroken and so many things.

“I know, I know, I know,” Merlin said, unable to say anything else.

The light in the meadow had started to change, the gold giving way to air tinted pink, a sunset with no center.

“You never—you were never there. After.”

Merlin let out a harsh laugh, throat closing, “I couldn't be. I had to wait for you.”

“Well, I got sick of waiting for _you_.” Arthur pulled back just enough to glare at Merlin, his eyes blurry with tears, face blotchy red, still beautiful, still Merlin's king, his other half. “Do you know how long I had to look for you? For any part of you? Any thread? Finally, in a damn _meadow_ that doesn't even properly _exist_!”

His arm was still around Merlin's waist, hand still on his neck, and Merlin's hands had dropped to rest on Arthur's hips. It was all so familiar and so new at the same time, sense memories overlaid with false memories overlaid with dreams.

“What? What do you mean—”

“Oh, shut up,” Arthur said, then used the pressure of his hand against Merlin's neck to pull him in and kiss him. It was everything they never had but also, somehow, a perfect summation of everything they did. It was the final piece, after so long, after so many lifetimes, slotted into place, a sort of resolution that was an endless horizon. It was a bit overwhelming and Merlin moved to kiss Arthur's chin, his cheekbones, his forehead, then back to his mouth. It was clumsy and chaste and everything felt suspended, until Merlin bit Arthur's lower lip gently, tugged it a little less so, and time jolted forward again when Arthur let out a surprised breath, the edge of it curled with want. Then Arthur was pressing him down, hand in Merlin's hair, cradling his head from the ground.

They kissed until the light dipped blue and Merlin had to stop because he _knew_ this color, he knew the meadow in the dusk. It was the same as the image the meadow had fed him so long ago when his magic asked what it was.

“Arthur, I think I made this place. At some point. Or, I will.”

They lay flat on the crushed grasses, Merlin on his back with an arm around Arthur's shoulders, and Arthur on his side curled into him like a comma. Arthur mouthed drowsily at Merlin's neck and hummed. His breath ghosted over Merlin's ear and sent an easy, hazy wave of pleasure through him.

“Probably. It'd be like you to make a ridiculous meadow in the middle of actual nowhere just so you can laze about.”

Merlin pinched his shoulder and Arthur retaliated by slipping a hand up under Merlin's shirt to dig his fingers into Merlin's ribs. Merlin squirmed, laughed, but Arthur only did it for a moment and then they were both still again. The sky was a deep velvety indigo, the air warm.

“Thank you,” Arthur said suddenly. “For making me who I was. Who I am.”

It hovered between them until Merlin said, “Thank you. For the same.”

A brush of Arthur's fingers at his waist and then Arthur sat up, bits of plant in his hair.

“Alright then, up. Time to work. I may be dead, but I don't fancy sleeping on the ground if I don't have to. Put your magic to use and make a cabin or something.”

Merlin let Arthur haul him up and they were both smiling, Merlin grinning so hard his cheeks hurt. He let his eyes flash bright and gold, relished in the thrill of using his magic for Arthur again, what it loved most. The cabin appeared like it had always been there, which maybe it had.

Arthur rolled his eyes but he was still smiling, too, and he didn't sound the least bit upset when he said, “It better be nice. We've got an eternity with it, after all. Give or take a few non-corporeal explorations.”

He took Merlin's hand and led him along the wheel rut path to the cabin. For the first time since leaving Camelot centuries ago, Merlin felt like he had come home.


End file.
